Barron's MFQ

Swallowed Up

Stringent, expensive regulations boost the pressure on small fund
firms to consolidate

FOR 25 YEARS, L. ROY PAPP & Associates was a family business in a strict sense. After returning from the Philippines, where he had served as U.S. ambassador to the Asian Development Bank, Roy Papp founded the company in 1978 in Phoenix, where the climate felt right after his two-year stay in Manila.

With the help of his son Harry and daughter-in-law Rosellen, Papp gradually built the firm's reputation as a solid growth manager. By the end of last year, it had accumulated $600 million in assets, including $150 million...